Intel bets big on driverless car tech with $15.3bn MobilEye buyout

Intel riding the driverless highway

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With PC sales slowing and Intel seeming incapable of making up the ground lost to mobile chip rivals like Qualcomm, the computing company is having to diversify its interests – and self-driving cars seem to have risen to the top of Intel's agenda, as it's just spent a whopping $15.3 billion in order to acquire MobilEye and its autonomous vehicle tech.

Having previously worked with MobilEye on BMW's iNext self-driving vehicle platform, Intel now hopes to leverage the experience of the Israeli-based company to build a third-party self-driving system architecture that any car manufacturer can buy into.

Rather than developing pricey algorithms and a driverless knowledge base, car manufacturers will instead just be able to dip into Intel and MobilEye's pool.

Tesla troubles

MobilEye is not a company immune to controversy, however. It experienced a relatively acrimonious split with Tesla after voicing concerns over the way Elon Musk's company was selling its driver-assistance features. MobilEye built the system, and felt that Tesla was dangerously close to selling the concept to the public as a completely driverless solution at the time.

It's a huge purchase (and one of the biggest in Israeli tech history), but it seems a relatively safe bet for Intel. With everyone from Google to Uber and Ford to Tesla preparing for the driverless revolution, Intel will want to make sure it's on the starting grid, and not repeating the rolling start it's faced with mobile.